Just back from a three day weekend in Hokkaido. Attended a friend’s wedding in Sapporo, met another friend’s baby in Yoichi, and glimpsed some amazing fall foliage.
Hokkaido in the Fall. (Taken from train on the way back to the airport.)
There used to be direct flights from Okinawa to Sapporo. Now you have to change in either Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka or Fukuoka. It makes the journey longer, more expensive and less environmentally friendly. Hopefully they’ll bring back direct flights in the future.
TRAVEL 67 : Chris Willson Photography 
Expect even fewer flights, not more. With JAL in near bankruptcy and ANA in no mood to end up the same way they’re no longer willing or able to bankroll chronically money-losing flights to regional airport.
So Osaka to eastern Hokkaido – Memanbetsu near Abashiri and Tanchou near Kushiro – are disappearing next year, and apparently so are most other flights to those destinations. Which is a crying shame as Akan and Shiretoko national parks become far less accessible to visitors, and less hospitable as the current visitor infrastructure crumbles.
A couple of days ago there was a beautiful photo of the autumn foliage around a waterfall in Hokkaido on the BBC website. Unfortunately I can’t find it again and wished I had copied it to your blog immediately!
Over in England the fun stage of crunching through dry crisp leaves on the pavement has now been superseeded by slipping on wet leaves.